A woman who lost her daughter in the Enniskillen bombing has said she is “shocked” by Government proposals to introduce a statute of limitations on Troubles prosecutions.
oan Wilson’s daughter Marie died in the no-warning Provisional IRA blast at the cenotaph on November 8, 1987.
If the government plans, announced on Wednesday, become law, they will mean that the perpetrators of the Enniskillen bomb, and countless other atrocities, will not be prosecuted.
Mrs Wilson, who is now 90, said: “I find that really shocking, and I can hardly take it in.
“I have good days and not so good days, but that is the kind of news that brings back all of the past, and it sets me back for days.
“I also feel sorry for all the other victims of violence and their families who may not receive justice for the terrible crimes committed on them, and my heart goes out to them all.”
The Enniskillen bomb killed 12 people — including student nurse Marie (20) — and injured 68 others.
The words of forgiveness from Marie’s father Gordon Wilson in a BBC interview hours after the bombing made worldwide headlines.
No one has been convicted of the atrocity.
Mrs Wilson said: “By this stage I don’t expect that anyone will be found guilty of that terrible crime and we are unlikely to get justice.
“However, I don’t want to know the identity of those who killed my Marie and the other victims of Enniskillen, and badly injured so many innocent people, or to meet them.
“The bombers are not known to us, but they know who they are, and they have had to live all their lives knowing that they committed those murders and caused so much pain and grief to so many people.
“They may not be apprehended now, but God knows who they are too, and they will have to face a final judgment higher than that of any court in this land.
“I still think of the bombers who caused the Enniskillen blast.
“I don’t think of them every day, but there are times when I feel really low and I think of them, and pray for them. I don’t know how they can live with themselves, knowing what they have done.”
Mrs Wilson says that her sense of loss never leaves her.
She added: “I was at a very happy family engagement party this week but I missed Marie terribly because she was not there. She was such a lively person and would have loved being with the family on such a wonderful occasion.
“I still regret so much what she lost when her life was cut so short, and I also deeply regret what we have missed because she has not been with us for all of these years.
“I look at my beautiful five grandchildren and six great-grandchildren and our wider family, and I think of how much we have lost not having her with us, and how much she lost by not being with us. That feeling of regret never goes away.”
Mrs Wilson is a lifelong, devout Methodist whose strong Christian faith sustains her every day.
For many years while she was physically able to do so, she brought comfort to other families who were bereaved during the Troubles, including relatives of the Omagh bombing victims, and she shared her experience with them, as best she could.
She also helped with the writing of books on her late husband Gordon and Marie, and she collaborated on a book of her own reminiscences titled “All Will Be Well.”
She said: “I tried hard to bring comfort to other people because I know how awful it is to lose a loved one in this way.
“People sometimes said to me ‘Time heals everything’, but it doesn’t. It only teaches you to cope.”
Mrs Wilson says that her late husband would also be shocked by the news of a possible statute of limitations.
She added: “Like me, he missed Marie every day, and sometimes I would hear him up in our bedroom sobbing with grief.
“I felt that I could not intervene to comfort him until his time of grieving was over.”
Mr Wilson, an Enniskillen draper, was buried in a deluge of rubble beside Marie after the bomb exploded.
Holding hands under six feet of masonry, they comforted each other until Marie lost consciousness.
She died six hours later in Erne hospital where in another part of the building her father was receiving emergency treatment for a badly dislocated shoulder.
On the night of the bombing, he responded spontaneously to the query from a BBC reporter about his views on those who murdered Marie and all the others.
In one of the most iconic statements of the Troubles he said: “I bear no ill-will. I bear no grudge. Dirty sort of talk is not going to bring her back to life.
“Don’t ask me, please, for a purpose. I don’t have a purpose. I don’t have an answer.
“But I know that there has to be a plan.
“It’s part of a greater plan, and God is good. And we shall meet again”.
His words brought tributes from many people around the world, including the Queen who mentioned him in her Christmas Day broadcast in 1987.
Following his physical recovery, Mr Wilson, like his wife Joan, worked tirelessly for peace and he became a Senator in the Irish parliament.
They also helped with the founding and promotion of the cross-community Spirit of Enniskillen bursary scheme.
Gordon continued with his cross-community work until his death on June 27, 1995, aged 67.
Mrs Wilson added: “These events may seem to other people to belong to long ago, and many do not know or do not remember or take on board the deals of what we have had to go through over the years.
“However, if you lose a loved one the pain never leaves you, and that’s why I am so shocked by the latest news about a possible amnesty.
“People like me have to live with the loss and pain for the rest of our lives.”
